ABOUT US

2016 ANNUAL REPORT

We are excited to report an amazing year of ministry and want to say thank you to all of our partners and friends. At times, we take for granted that as our ministry and organizational structure grows, there are still thousands of students coming into a personal relationship with Christ and being challenged to take the next step in their faith journeys. 2016 marked many significant changes in our organizational structure. We made a strong effort in our financial department, bringing on two full-time staff and saw great strides in our organizational structure. We hired a full-time Community Development Coordinator to support our eight staff living in our partner communities full-time. And we continued to put a greater focus on using pouring our resources into sustainable community efforts. But while all this was going on, we celebrate that over 6,000 students were exploring their faith and experiencing God in new and radical ways all across the world. We are grateful for this platform and that God is using a group of ordinary people in such remarkable ways. Thanks again to all those who make this ministry possible and praise God for his continued grace and provision!

BY THE NUMBERS

6,003 Participants

15 Community Partnerships

138 Summer Staff

137 Mission Trips

279 Church Partners

142 Homes Repair Partnerships

WORSHIP OVERVIEW

Have you ever thought about all of the boxes in our lives? Some boxes we place ourselves in through self-doubt and image. Other boxes and placed on us from friends, family or years of the world giving us a message. And often times this leads to the greatest box of all; the box that we place God in. This past summer we teamed up with spoken word and musical artist Propaganda to challenge students to break out of these boxes. Through an artistic and creative series, all filmed inside a 20×20 white box, Propaganda brought life to a beautiful message of who God is, who God can be and how to break out of our Box to serve him faithfully. The series once again generated some of the best feedback we have ever received and we praise God for the ways He used it in students and community member’s lives.

2015 ANNUAL REPORT

This year marked the first year in Next Step history that we did not see a growth in student participants, however, it felt like perhaps our largest year of growth as a ministry. Over the past two years, our leadership team has taken some of our attention off of student recruiting and re-focused it on internal growth within our communities and partnerships. This year’s overview reflects that focus as our participant numbers stabled (32 less than 2014) while our resources in our partner communities soared. At the focal point of this community growth, we celebrated being able to hire four new Partnership Coordinators that are now living in our partner communities and focused on year-long ministry. This was a huge step in the direction of community investment and partnerships for our ministry, as we felt we were able to put some skin in the game after launching a community development focus in 2014. We were once again blown away with the way God used this ministry in the lives of thousands of students as we heard story after story of salvation, commitment and surrender. We are so encouraged by the direction of Next Step as we challenge ourselves to be a place where short term missions truly collide with long term community development.

BY THE NUMBERS

6,390 Participants

16 Community Partnerships

147 Summer Staff

118 Mission Trips

313 Church Partners

151 Homes Repair Partnerships

WORSHIP OVERVIEW

There is a simple truth in the world: God is greater. He is greater than coincidence, He is greater than our questions, He is greater than our shortcomings and He has a greater plan for our life than we could imagine. This year, Next Step teamed up with internationally acclaimed author and speaker, Francis Chan, to produce the original video series, “Greater Than”. It was a five-night message series with a backdrop of the Redwood forest where Francis challenged students to understand the greatness of God. The series was one of our most “direct” presentations of the Gospel and although it pushed students out of their comfort zone, it provided some of the best feedback of a video series in Next Step’s history.

2014 ANNUAL REPORT

Praise God for the opportunity to grow and serve this year. Coming off of our largest year of growth as a ministry in 2013, this year felt like a ‘deep breath’ and a time to re-focus on our purpose, vision, and execution of ministry. With the opportunity to respond as Christ’s hands and feet after Superstorm Sandy in 2013, our leadership team was focused on keeping up with the demand for student opportunities in disaster relief over the past 48 months. Although we were thankful for this opportunity, we also came away from the experience questioning the fast-pace model of short-term missions. We are proud to share we will look back at 2014 as a turning point for Next Step Ministries. After much prayer and reflection, our leadership team feels God is calling this ministry to be a place where short-term missions collide with long-term community development. This year, we posted an apology video on our website explaining that at times in an attempt to create the best student ministry experience, we fall short in our responsibility to the communities we serve in. With that heart, we are excited to re-shape our vision as a ministry to include a focus on the sustainable development of the communities we partner in. We know this will be a long road of learning ahead of us, but we are excited to embark on this journey of responsible missions and see where God continues to lead our hearts.

BY THE NUMBERS

6,422 Participants

14 Community Partnerships

129 Summer Staff

126 Mission Trips

302 Church Partners

163 Homes Repair Partnerships

WORSHIP OVERVIEW

Do you feel free? That was the question master illusionist Harris III asked students in this year’s original film series, “Shattered”. Perhaps the most creative series to date, the Next Step creative team filmed a live illusion show and intertwined a compelling story line that touched the hearts of student’s walking through the challenges of life as a teenager. In the series, Harris III urged students to shatter their perspectives of who God was and what life can look like when we are truly free. The five-part series cultivated on Friday night with Harris III calling on all students to conquer their fears and ‘walk on water’ as Jesus did. The series was a student favorite as it was one of our more light-hearted and engaging series.